More than fifty civilians were killed Sunday in alleged jihadist attacks in the north of the country.
According to local sources, the assailants arrived by motorbike and attacked people in the villages of Karou, Ouatagouna, and Daoutegeft. They burned houses and took away livestock.
Twenty civilians were killed in Karou, fourteen in Ouatagouna, and several people in the hamlet of Daoutegeft in the Gao region, according to a security source.
This provisional toll could rise as the attack in this border area with Niger also left several people injured.
The new violence is a blow to the fight against terrorism led by the G5 Sahel joint force made up of Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mauritania.
Mali, a landlocked West African country, has been trying to emerge from a political crisis since the army’s coup against President Ibrahima Boubacar Keïta on 18 August 2020.
The military, which reproached the IBK regime for its inaction in the face of jihadist attacks, has in turn found itself mired in security turmoil since taking power.
The independence uprisings of 2012 have given way in recent years to jihadist attacks often attributed to groups such as Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State.
CD/lb/abj/APA